Letter of thanks and appreciation to the rabbi

To dear Rabbi Michael Avraham.
I finally found time to write to you what I’ve wanted to write for a long time.
My name is Y., a second-grade student in one of the yeshivahs, and I am the one who published (together with a friend) the article about the Datlash on the Srougim website and on other sites (the article that you followed with the post about the repeaters in the question). At the time, we spoke a little on the phone.
I am sending this letter to express my immense appreciation for you and your special work (of course, Oren, the editor of the site, is also included in this praise), which unfortunately I do not know of, or even close to.
I frequently enjoy your wonderful website, the lessons and articles, the intellectual honesty and the way things are presented.
I wrote the article about those who repeat the question following my experiences in high school yeshiva, where I saw before my eyes how my classmates were fed up with “old Judaism,” and since no alternative was presented, they left the religion full of sky-high self-confidence and pride in their “dark” religious friends who couldn’t even understand why they repeated the question.
Their choice was between Judaism full of unacceptable ideas (mysticism, “heresy” in science, extreme right-wingism, “prohibition” of using thinking alone, etc., the latest generations are necessarily complete fools compared to the first, the sages said all the legends and laws in the Holy Spirit, so they must be true, etc.), and “enlightened” atheism, and without a doubt the latter prevails.
While still in my studies, following exposure to all the rustic opinions brought by the aforementioned students, I was forced to slowly build myself a more and more “rational” Judaism. I jumped at every rational bargain, and I had to find out things for myself.
One of the difficulties that bothered me (among many others) was the issue of the “validities” that are crammed into the Gemara (although this is not a serious theological difficulty, I was bothered by the fact that things that are not written in the Mishnah are inserted into it).
I started thinking about an idea that would solve the issue, and it is similar to what you say in the series of lessons on Ukmity (it was still far from the complete picture that the rabbi was able to present in the lessons).
I don’t understand why a teenager has to go through 20 years of his life before he encounters (if at all, because most people will never encounter them) your lessons on sustainability (I’m taking this as an example, since this is not a sensational innovation from a traditional perspective, such as knowledge and choice, providence, etc. It is a subject that I have no explanation for how it took us 1500 years to solve). My feeling is that we have long since abandoned independent thinking, which on the one hand makes it easier for us to preserve Judaism from generation to generation (which seems good in the short term), and on the other hand prevents us from reaching in-depth explanations on many subjects (dangerous in the long term) such as your explanation of sustainability, subjects that do not have the scent of “Reform” that could explain our lack of progress on them.
I remember how during the discussions in Israel about the Rabbi’s words regarding the beautiful woman, I was left without a decent explanation for myself (I felt this with other people as well), although sometimes rabbis explain this issue in a tiny bit here and a tiny bit there, but I have never seen an organized, systematic and consistent approach to these issues like yours.
From a survey I conducted with very famous rabbis who are considered good in the field of answering questions of faith, almost none of them are knowledgeable about the issues that truly bother young people (revelations in other tribes, Torah and morality) and neither do they dare to express “new” opinions (such as the Shelah’s system regarding free choice, which almost no one knows, and even one of the rabbis who mentions this opinion immediately rejects it at the beginning of his article). Not to mention “proofs” of G-d.
Since I studied with these friends of mine for years, I have no doubt that if they had been introduced to your character at an early stage – they would have been in a completely different place (at least some of them).
I know exactly what issues bothered them, and those are the issues you’re talking about.
Two of my questions that I asked on the site were about the Exodus from Egypt in archaeology and the mass apparitions in other tribes. As the rabbi himself can see, these questions are placed first in the ‘Popular Responsa’. I knew that these were key things that really bothered people, so I asked them.
Personally, the rabbi shaped a central part of my faith, and I hardly find others who can quench my thirst (perhaps the rabbi can renew it for me).
I sometimes wander through youth forums and refer people to your site. Several of them have already told me that they have changed their minds about faith, etc., in addition to people to whom I have given a few ideas from your teachings and it has helped them, so that the rabbi’s hand may be strengthened in his important work of answering questions on the site.
Your teaching is a unique solution for many people, and I regret that many of them take the step of repeating the question before they recognized it.
In connection with the criticisms raised against your openness, I think there are enough semi-conservative rabbis, and we cannot give up on a rabbi who will fully explore all the most difficult issues.
We don’t have anyone else who does this the way the Rabbi does, and despite the cost this may have caused for some people (it is debatable whether it is a cause or a catalyst), the benefit outweighs it tenfold, and the Rabbi is a very strong rear line of defense for many people.
With immense appreciation and gratitude for your extensive investment in youth (on the website and in the books) and in general, and with great anticipation for the release of the trilogy,